It has been 50 years since man last walked on the moon, but it appears that is about to change. Billionaires have been rocketing into orbit for a while now, and public concerns have likewise announced bold intentions. NASA’s Artemis program, for example, plans to land a woman or person of color on the moon, perhaps as early as 2026 – a departure, seeing as the 12 previous people to walk the lunar landscape (including the last of those, Gene Cernan, in 1972) were all white males. Moreover, Artemis, which works in conjunction with commercial and international partners, announced on its website t ..read more

We already know that graphene, a one-atom-thick layer of carbon discovered in 2004, can be used as a conductor, insulator and filter – that it can even be used to create ultra-light, ultra-thick body armor, as well as wearable electronics. What has recently come to light, however, is that graphene can also impact the art world, whether it is fashioned into art itself or used as a means to preserve existing works. A September 2021 study published in the scientific journal Nature Nanotechnology concluded that graphene, when placed in what has been described as “an invisible veil” over certain pa ..read more

It has long been known that graphene can serve as a superconductor or insulator. But in February 2021, MIT researchers discovered that this material, an atom-thick layer of carbon arranged in a hexagonal pattern, is even more versatile than anyone might have imagined: It also exhibits ferroelectrical qualities. In other words, it spontaneously polarizes. That discovery “may pave the way for an entire generation of new ferroelectrics materials,” as Pablo Jarillo-Herrero, the MIT physics professor who led the study, put it in a post on the university’s website. Specifically, the post noted the i ..read more

Concrete and discarded rubber tires represent two of the world’s greatest environmental hazards. Is it possible that a discovery by a team of Rice University scientists earlier this year could help curtail the impact of both? Using the same “flash” process that the team first introduced in 2020 — i.e., giving old tires a jolt of electricity that left only carbon atoms behind — the researchers were left with turbostratic graphene, once the atoms reassembled. The solubility of this material enabled it to be incorporated into cement to produce concrete that is more environmentally friendly than i ..read more

Faster — it’s the buzzword of the century. We want it all and we want it faster. Unfortunately, faster is impossible in some cases. We’ll never be able to control how quickly a waitress brings our coffee or how long it takes our children to clean their rooms. We can, however, control the internet and recent research says that yes, we can make it faster — with graphene.  Currently, we transmit data from the internet using fiber optic cables and electro-optic switches. The data is converted to light at one end, travels at the speed of light through a fiber optic cable, and is interpreted an ..read more

It is a well-established fact that there is far more to graphene than meets the eye. It is just a one-atom-thick layer of graphite, meaning it is one million times thinner than the diameter of a human hair. Yet it is the strongest man-made material ever made — 200 times stronger than steel, in fact. It also conducts electricity 13 times better than copper and conducts heat at enhanced levels as well. And finally, it is lightweight, flexible and corrosion-proof. That means it has implications in a wide variety of fields, including electronics, robotics and even the medical sector. Beyond that ..read more

Scientists have figured out a way to magnetize graphene, which could make possible lightning-fast microcomputers and electronics that defy the imagination. But as with graphene itself, the full potential of the magnetized version of this substance — an atom-thick layer of graphite — has yet to be realized. Certainly, though, this represents another step forward for graphene, which was discovered only in 2002 by Andre Geim, a physics professor at the University of Manchester, in the United Kingdom. Some 12 years later, a New Yorker headline breathlessly raised the possibility that graphene “may ..read more

As the world’s dependence on sustainable energy grows, so too does the need for efficient, cost-effective solar cells. About 1.8 percent of the electricity generated in the U.S. in 2019 was from solar power, and that is only expected to increase. In fact, solar is projected to grow faster than any other energy source between now and 2050. Hence the emphasis on efficiency, and in recent months, researchers at the Italian Institute of Technology (IIT) combined two powerful materials — graphene and perovskite-silicon — to improve it by up to 20 percent. Until now, standard solar cells — composed ..read more

Graphene oxide is a substance known for its flexibility. It’s true in a literal sense, as when it is used in solar cells or electronics, and true in the sense that it is extremely versatile. In fact, graphene oxide — i.e., an oxidized form of graphene — can be found in such divergent items as lithium batteries, sensors and membranes. And in March 2020, an international team of scientists discovered that when that substance was 3D-printed in combination with a certain protein, it could form what were described as “tissue-like vascular structures.”  This represents the latest advance in the ..read more

Over the past 20 years, there has been a strong push to develop more efficient solutions for artificial lighting. Incandescent bulbs were the dominant technology for over 100 years, but by the 2000s, environmentalists concerned with the limited energy efficiency and waste generated by incandescent bulbs started promoting longer-lasting CFL bulbs, as well as LED lights. Lasting years longer than traditional incandescent bulbs, CFL and LED lighting generate much less waste over the same amount of time. But there remains one major concern: They contain mercury, which poses a potentially significa ..read more